Here is Gone
by Aama
Summary: InuYasha's profound thoughts on himself and Kikyo--what they were and what they could have been together. *Finished*!!!
1. Part One

A/N: This is my second song fic and third InuYasha fan fic. Yaay! I'm so proud of myself! Anyways, this is based on a beautiful song by the Goo Goo Dolls called "Here is Gone" off their latest album Gutterflower. So please don't go running to their manager saying that some girl has stolen their song.please please!!  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own the manga or anime of InuYasha, and I don't own.hell, I'm not writing it again.just see above! ^_^  
  
Warning: A little bit of cussing. These are InuYasha's deepest thoughts, you know! So beware! ^_^  
  
  
  
Here is Gone  
  
Part One  
  
  
  
*****You and I got something  
  
But it's all and then it's nothing to me.*****  
  
The only thing that still really gets to me is the damn guilt. And it only gets to me because it's what eats away at me, almost like it's saying Look at me! You know I'm here, don't you?! You know that I'm not going to go away! It's a constant goddamn annoyance that won't leave me the hell alone.  
  
I take that back. Maybe it's the other things I feel along with the guilt; the other things that are mixed in with it like a medicine that's supposed to help me heal, but only makes me sicker. That never-ending pressure on my insides when I think about you. That utter feeling of desertion when I remember you attacking me, knowing that you wanted me dead.  
  
Betrayal.  
  
Anger.  
  
And because of all these feelings, my emotions fluctuate dangerously. One moment I feel so calm, so held together; then, the next minute I feel like my insides are being pulled in opposite directions out of my body. I feel pain. The emotional kind, at least.  
  
I never felt that kind of pain before, you know. When both of us were alive, I was numb to that kind of damn pain. And my feelings for you didn't fluctuate like they do now; now, when I know that you are in reality an earthen body filled with the left-overs of your soul and an intense desire to see me dead.  
  
  
  
  
  
*****And I got my defenses  
  
When it comes to your intentions for me.*****  
  
I try not to think about how you feel for me. About how desperate you are to see me fall into hell. I do think of you, however. It's hard not to. I see you sometimes so damn clearly that I feel that familiar ache, quickly followed by skepticism. And it all ends up spiraling down into sadness and pity for you.  
  
But I do think of you. Your eyes were the strangest thing I had ever seen. Even now, fifty years later, I still see them. They could become the eyes of a normal woman for a single second, then avert back to the piercing and untrusting gaze of a priestess. At times you could look almost carefree. I watched you constantly, and sometimes when I was very close to you, I could see the transformation so clearly on your face. Tension would fade into serenity almost like a river flowing into the ocean. And I would wonder what in all the hells did that to you, what made you suddenly appear so at peace with the world even though your life gave you anything but peace. I suppose that was one of the many things that contributed to my falling in love with you.  
  
So I guess the past is my defense against you and your constant presense in my mind. I try to forget how you are now, with your false body and meager, unnatural soul.  
  
And then I suddenly find myself feeling guilty yet again. Because I find myself longing for what is gone. I feel angry with myself for wanting to return to a time and place that has long been in the past and out of my reach. Out of your reach. What the hell-out of both of our reaches.  
  
And it's the anger that gets the best of me, goddamn it! I want what is gone, and I know that I can't have it. And it enrages me beyond my own belief. And I find myself wondering exactly how much I really loved you to desire to go back to that time when all that existed to me was you. Just you.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A/N: I'm not really sure yet just how long this supposed "short story" is gonna get. I would like it to be four parts long like its predicesor "Riverwide". Just to let you know, you can read this without any problem if you didn't read "Riverwide"; they aren't really connected, only in the set-up (both deal with thoughts more-so that action). I 


	2. Part Two

Disclaimer: This fic is derived from a song by the Goo Goo Dolls, and therefore I own no part of it save for what I've written from my own mind. I don't own InuYasha either!  
  
Part Two  
  
*****And we wake up in the breakdown of the things we never thought we could be.*****  
  
I'm sure that neither of us thought that any of this could ever happen. You dying, me being put to sleep for fifty years, Kagome finding me. Oh gods-Kagome. Kagome. Just the thought of her makes me feel guilty for some reason.  
  
I don't know what to really think about that girl. I'm not even sure who she is. Your reincarnation? Or just some girl from another point in time? I mean, I've seen where she's from; but no matter how many times I go there, I still can't believe that it's Japan- five centuries away from where I am.  
  
Goddamn it! No wonder I feel eaten alive by guilt! I'm thinking of you one minute-then of her the next. It seems like I'm punishing myself for what I feel for both of you. It's like my mind and my heart know it's not right.  
  
Why the hell did it have to be me? Why the hell did it have to be you? What did we do to deserve what that bastard Naraku did to us?  
  
Ever since you were brought back, I've wondered about what you're thinking. Was it all him, or did the fates have anything to do with what happened to us? Ok, so I'm a half-demon, and you're a human priestess. Were the gods really that pissed off at us to allow something so goddamn horrible to happen just to keep us apart-just to make us hate each other?  
  
I'm sure that neither of us ever thought about the consequences of what we were planning to do that day. I was ready to give up everything about me that was demon-my strength, my dog-like traits, even all my demonic emotional attributes. I was ready to become like you, and I would have done it if we had gotten out chance. But then all that shit happened. And even worse-we were fooled into thinking it was each other who had done it all.  
  
But still, do you ever wonder what it would have been like if things had happened like we'd planned. If I had become a man, and you had become a normal woman?  
  
*****I'm not the one who broke you. I'm not the one you should fear. What do you got to move you, darling?*****  
  
I didn't betray you. I didn't. It was him. All of it. Everything that happened that day, everything that tore us apart-he did it all.  
  
And yet you still seem to adamant on dragging me down to hell with you. Why? Why are you starving to see me die? Revenge for what you think I did? Hatred, perhaps? Hatred that somehow, after all those years, I was allowed to begin my life again-and you weren't? Kagome's presence with me? Is that why you hate me? Because she, your supposed reincarnation, was the one who gave me life again?  
  
Hell. Is that really where you went? Is that where you've been these past fifty years? In hell? Some how, I just cannot believe that. You weren't destined to go to hell. You had a pure heart, a benevolent heart, a heart wanting for the good of others. You were never selfish or proud. You never killed or harmed for your own pleasure. You never did anything remotely close to evil.  
  
Were you really in hell?  
  
Every day, I find myself hoping that you weren't. I just can't make myself believe that you were.  
  
*****I thought I lost you somewhere, but you were never really ever there at all.*****  
  
I can still remember that day so clearly. The day when I woke up. I could smell you-your hair, your skin, your sweat. I could smell fear and audacity mixed together. I was sure it was you. And I felt spite and relief clash together inside of me. I felt malevolence and sympathy. Malice and passion. There are so many words to describe the emotions that I started drowning in.  
  
But you seemed so different when I saw you. You seemed so animated, so alive, so full of vigor. Then you touched me and I was able to see you and smell you fully-and only then did I realize that it wasn't you who was pressed against me on that tree. It was Kagome.  
  
And my heart sunk into my stomach and flew into the sky at the same damn time.  
  
It felt like my entire body was under attack, from the inside out. Everything blurred for a moment, and I didn't know what the hell to do. I just stared at her, like she knew all the answers. Now, when I think long and hard about it, I often wonder what I had really wanted. Did I want her to be you, still alive and well; or did I want her to be her-- someone new, someone to help me forget about you?  
  
After a moment, I let myself become callous and unemotional. In truth, I had no idea what else to do. Then the centipede woman attacked, and the girl seemed to be so helpless. That only strengthened the reality that it wasn't you. And once again, I felt elated and disappointed at the same time.  
  
Here was a girl, totally powerless, depending on someone to save her. And I did. And in a way, she saved me as well. She pulled your arrow from my chest and released me. You could have taken care of yourself; you wouldn't have needed me like she did. You were nearly invincible when I had known you. I would have been useless to you.  
  
But why did I suddenly feel so vigorous the moment I was released? Because I had been trapped there for fifty years, or because there was someone dependant on me? Someone I had felt an abrupt urge to help. Someone so like you-and yet so different. Someone who needed me.  
  
We were both lost to each other that day fifty years ago; it was long before you died, and long before I fell asleep. The moment our trust for each other was shattered and absorbed into the air around us. We lost each other in that moment. And now it's too late to search for each other. It seems I'll never find you, and it seems you'll never find me.  
  
And just as I felt elation and fury in that moment I saw Kagome, I feel the same knowing that the two of us may never truly be at peace with each other. And the guilt begins its feasting again-hollowing me from the inside out.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A/N: Part two! Man, I had to force myself to write this for some reason. I just had no muse; I had to create my own. But I'm very pleasantly surprised at how well it turned out. Hopefully you like it too!! This is the end of the first verse of the song, so the next installment will be the chorus!  
  
Thank you for your reviews! They really help me more than I can say! ^_^ 


	3. Part Three

Warning: Once again, this is inspired by "Here is Gone" by the Goo Goo Dolls and I have no smidgen of ownership of the song or the anime InuYasha.  
  
Part Three  
  
*****And I want to get free. Talk to me. I can feel you falling.*****  
  
Don't you see that I don't want things to be like this? Can't you see that I'm not your enemy? Can't you see that you're not mine? Hell, perhaps you're blinded by too many things. After all, you did pass through this world and the next to be resurrected. After all, you were hurled into a false body made out of nothing but the waste of the earth. Perhaps those traumatic events have made you blind to my face and deaf to my words.  
  
If we could only speak to each other. Alone. Freely. No one else but us. Nothing between us but air. No hatred. No spite. No pain. Maybe then, we could reconcile and forgive-or at least come to an understanding.  
  
Damn it all! Can't you see how you've trapped me? Every single day, I wonder if it will be the day you come for me again. I wonder if it will be the day you succeed in killing me. I wonder if it will be the day you understand that it was Naraku and not me who murdered you. I wonder if it will be the day I see you depart in peace to wherever you went when you died. Heaven or hell. As long as you go back in peace. No hatred. No spite. No pain.  
  
Until that day, I'm trapped in a spiral with you. To me it feels more like we're in the eye of a hurricane, being hurled through the air, being bashed against each other, being torn from each other. And until it dies, we are trapped there together at the mercy of the storm.  
  
Every minute of every day I can feel you falling apart. You're held together so crudely. You seem so fragile. So feeble. So delicate. I often wonder why the wind hasn't dissipated your dirt and bone body yet. If I strain myself, I can hear the cracks in your earthen skin widen and lengthen. I can hear the dead souls seeping from your eyes, your ears, your mouth. I can feel you dying all over again. And it makes me ache so terribly for you.  
  
I can feel us falling further and further apart from each other. Further away from any chance for reconciliation. Further away from peace. And yet you seem so unaffected, so oblivious to the shattering of the world that surrounds you. To the eminent shattering of your own body. And I want to cry out to you, to scream at you, to beg you to hold still so the wind won't blow you apart, to plead with you to just return to the earth and return to the Afterlife. In peace. Goddamn it, Kikyo! In peace!  
  
But once again I realize how deaf you are. And I realize that nothing I say will help. So I return to silence-and my pity for you.  
  
*****And I wanted to be all you need. Somehow here is gone.*****  
  
I doubt that you would believe this now, but I really was more than ready to become a man for you. I was ready to give up my demonic heritage and allow my humanity to vanquish me. If that doesn't say anything about how much I cared for you, then I don't know what the hell does.  
  
And I can't help but wonder how it would have been for us if things had gone as planned. Would we have married? Would we have had children? It seems almost like pure idiocy now. A half demon who became a man and married a priestess. But, is that how it would have been for us if you had given me the jewel to use and purify?  
  
Would we have been happy together? Would the village had accepted me as your husband, and not as a poor half-breed you took pity on? I almost shudder thinking about it now, wondering what we would have gone through if your people had spurned you for taking a half-breed as a husband. And demons, knowing who we had once been-would they have sought for our deaths? Would we have been hunted for what we had dared to do? Or would we have simply been as happy as a husband and wife could?  
  
I sigh and shake my head at the utter foolishness of thinking such things now. No matter where my mind and thoughts take me, the truth is still very clear. All those things are in the past. Out of our reach. And even if we could somehow return to those days, fifty years ago, things would only repeat themselves. That is a law of time and space. The past cannot be altered.  
  
So, it appears that all that is left to us is the present. And the future, of course. But our paths lie in separate parts of the world, and they go in separate directions. Yours lies above the earth and beneath the sky-stuck somewhere between life and death. And it winds and curves dangerously. Mine is anchored safely to the ground; and although its curves are just as perilous and uncertain as yours, it seems to be pointed in the direction of assurance and safety. I have a haven set in my vision. A girl with a face so like yours whose spirit couldn't be any more opposite. Darkness is all I believe your blinded eyes can see. And when walking alone in darkness, you are destined to fall at some point.  
  
  
  
  
  
A/N: Man, I'm surprised everyone is so open to this IY/Kikyo pairing. Almost all other fics with this pairing seem to be looked over. Thanks so much for reading!  
  
Reply to reviewers:  
  
Thunk: Don't worry about being eloquent. Some days I can spit out the most intricate sentences.and other days, well.ummm.I'm like this. ^_^  
  
Lara Winner: You're very welcome for the review! And thanks for this one!!  
  
Lynx lady: You know, that's the main reason I wrote this fic and "Riverwide", to try to pick apart the characters personality to try to better know them. I've also found it actually helps when you write a "regular" fanfiction along with them. And thanks for the review of "Riverwide" as well! ^_^ p.s. I read your bio and I thought I'd let you know I'm of Irish and Norwegian decent as well (my father's mother is full Norwegian).  
  
Thanks to all of you for the great reviews!! 


	4. Part Four

Disclaimer: I don't own InuYasha nor it's characters, and I surely don't own "Here is Gone" by the Goo Goo Dolls.  
  
Warning: A few bits of profanity here and there..  
  
Part Four  
  
*****I have no solution to the sound of this pollution in me.*****  
  
To be completely honest, I have no idea in hell how to make things right again. I don't know what to do. However, I do have a vague idea. Find a way to appease you without getting myself killed in the process- that's about as blunt as I can put it. But is that even possible? You said yourself that you died hating me, and that your soul could never move from the spot. Does that mean that even if you believed the truth about what Naraku did to us.that even then, you would still long to see me dead? Even after forgiving me for what I never did? Even after returning to the Afterlife? Even after all that.you would still want to see me dead and with you?  
  
The thought scares the shit out of me.  
  
No. That can't be true. You can't hate me that much. No. If only I can show you the truth and tell you what really happened, then you would forget about your revenge. You would die again and return to the land of the dead in peace like you deserve. Gods.if only. If only it was that easy for us.  
  
But even if we did settle the things between us and both go our separate ways at last-my damn guilt would still be there. I know it. Even now, when all hope for peace between us seems unbelievable, I know that I would still have guilt even if you went away in peace. I would keep the guilt for one reason only. My memories of you.  
  
No matter how many years pass, I know that I will still love you. I know that I'll see your face in my mind's eye every day that I wake up, and I know that I'll feel that pressure on my heart that I felt when we were both alive together. I know that I'll never forget you and who you were to me.  
  
And on top of all that-I realize that I'm falling in love with the girl that suddenly appeared in front of me one day, and woke me up from the fifty year sleep you put me in. How goddamn ironic is that?  
  
She's in my every thought. Every time I dare to take a glance at her, I feel like I'm being crushed from the inside out. But, in a strange way, I like the feeling. It's overwhelming, not bordering on painful-- not like the feeling you gave me. She takes over everything in me-my senses, my mind, my heart, my soul. But you-you only made me feel elated for a single moment, a small fraction of time. Then you would send me plummeting to the ground again with one simple blink of your eyes or gesture of your hands. Even now, I have no idea what caused that. I'm sure it wasn't your intentions to do that to me. I think it was me-my own subconscious telling me that you were not the one.  
  
Even so, I will always remember that you were the first person after my mother died to make me feel like a human being. After she died, my world went black. Everything seemed to either shrivel up and burrow into the ground or tower above me and try it's goddamn hardest to kill me. Everything and everyone made me feel useless, hated-made me feel no less than a freak of nature that should have never taken a first breath. But then I saw you one day, and you seemed to tear a hole in my black curtain and let the sun shine in for a brief moment. A moment that saved my life from the darkness that was consuming it. You loved me. And you made me feel like I had a place in the world.  
  
But Kagome. She never even bothered tearing a hole to let the light get a peek at me. She flung the damn curtains wide open and blinded the hell out of me. And she just stood there, proud of herself, bathed in the light that I hadn't seen for fifty years, and made me begin to fall in love with her.  
  
You never did that. You never will.  
  
And that's exactly why the guilt bears down on me and crushes the life out of me-because sometimes I find myself looking at her.and see you instead. And that scares me more than anything I'll ever come against in this world.  
  
  
  
*****And I was not the answer, so forget you ever though it was me.*****  
  
Every time I find myself thinking of you, only one thing is ever really heavy on my mind. The past. The past and the things that are in it. The key to finding peace is forgetting everything that caused the pain. Or so everyone says. And in our case, I guess it's forgetting everything that happened half a century ago. Forgetting the time that we spent together, the things that we said to each other, the evils that were done to both of us. And most of all-what we almost were together. Forget that we were ever in love. Forget that both of our lives almost changed drastically for the better or the worse. Forget it all.  
  
Even forget everything that could have happened in our future. The future, perhaps, is the most dangerous thing that either of us could ever dare to remember. Things that almost were and could have been. It seems like a ridiculous oxymoron to say such a thing, but I know that it's true. I know that trying to piece together what could have been will be my downfall. I know this because I know its something I desire so desperately to do.  
  
I believe that if we could only think of the things we could have done together, the places we could have gone, the people we could have known- then we could begin to heal. By allowing things that will never happen to surface in out minds, we can somehow get past them. We can escape them.  
  
But how foolish is that? Lingering on things that will never come to pass. Trying to live on what we see in the future.  
  
Once again, I find myself terrified. I feel helpless. I feel like I'm losing my mind. How in hell do I think these damn things up? Remembering the future to forget the past? Those are the thoughts of a lunatic!  
  
Maybe if you were able to see what the simple thought of you does to me, you'd understand. You slowly make me go insane-I guess that's the blunt way to say it. Here I am, trying my goddamn hardest to make sense of the things that are destroying me.and I end up realizing that I'm going crazy. How fun.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A/N: Thanks to everyone for the great (and non-bias) reviews!! Kudos to you all for being open to a Kikyo/InuYasha pairing (well, not really, but pretty close). A few more chapters to go after this one!!  
  
To lynxlady: I was really moved by your review. I get chill bumps when people point out exactly what got to them while they were reading my fic. Thank you so much for telling me that!!! ^_^  
  
Love and peace to everyone!!! 


	5. Part Five

Part Five  
  
*****And I don't need the fallout of all the past that's here between us.*****  
  
None of this is good for either of us. How obvious is that? I don't need to be terrorized by all these thoughts and emotions, and you don't need to be hell-bent on murder-even if you do believe that it's righteous vengeance.  
  
These memories and thoughts of all the things that could have happened are slowly breaking me down and tearing me apart. Every time a thought of you surfaces, I can feel something inside of me snap off and slowly and dissolve into my body as if it weren't of any importance to my being. Every time a memory of you slips through the barriers of my mind and begins its war on my emotions, I feel myself slowly succumbing to your intentions for me. I feel like I'm beginning to die.  
  
You appear in my mind in so many ways-in the body that died fifty years ago, in the body that was molded from the earth, in the body of the girl I began falling in love with. You speak to me, you listen to me, you touch me, you try to kill me, you try to heal me, you try to connect with me like you once did. Sometimes, you even appear to me as a simple thing taken from the expanse of the universe-a color, a sound, a simple act of nature. I've seen you in the surface of a lake as rain distorts the water into ripples and waves. I've seen you in the grass that covers the place where Kaede told me you had fallen and died. I envision the rich green carpet strewn with garnets and rubies sparkling brilliantly in the afternoon sun-then watch as the jewels turn into thick blood, seeping into the earth.  
  
It seems like lunacy is what forms these hallucinations and visions in my struggling mind, but in simple reality-it is you. Your memory is slowly destroying me, and here you are, trying your goddamn best to kill me with your own two hands. Why not allow the memories to do the job for you? Why soil your hands when the hands of your projections in my mind are already doing what you want to be done?  
  
I know I seem like a fool to say such a thing, but the urge to bear all is heavy on me for some reason. I cannot keep all this shit inside of my head and soul much longer-its poisoning me. Its frightening me. There is nothing in this world I would desire more than to rid my head of you. I would even give up my quest for the Shikon jewel if it meant you would be gone from my consciousness. If I could be free of your memory, your torment, your haunting, your lust for vengeance-all of you-I would gladly give you whatever you wanted from me. If you swore to leave me be and go in peace to wherever you came back from.if you swore to relieve me of my guilt.then I would give you anything in return. If you asked for it, Kikyo, I would give you my life.  
  
*****And I'm not holding on, And all your lies weren't enough to keep me here.*****  
  
But I could never forgive myself for doing that, even if it did mean peace for the both of us in some form and manner. 'How could you give in to death when you've done nothing to deserve it?'-- That's what Kagome would say if she could hear my thoughts. 'You never give up! Why would you do it now?!'  
  
Gods, I can hear her so clearly, almost as if she really were speaking to me. I suddenly realize that I do wish she could hear my thoughts. To see what is tormenting me on the inside, to see what effect she has on me, to see what I desire, what I dream of, what I wish could be over and done with.what I wish could begin. If she could see, then something could begin. Would she understand? Would she want to help me? Or would she think me foolish, incompetent, deranged-or just pitiful?  
  
But what if she would be willing to help me; not just in finding the shards and completing the jewel, but in finding and completing myself? Could she simply scour my soul, searching out and picking up the pieces of my broken self just as she'd done with the Shikon shards? Or would it be more meticulous, more painful? Would I give in to her and let her do what needed to be done only by her hands? Or would I fight even though my better judgment knew the importance of her medicinal touch and soothing words? Would I let her take me over in order to heal me?  
  
So many damn questions with absolutely no one but my own demented self to answer them. I feel like lashing out at something or screaming- anything to get rid of the frustration and the pain that I know is getting too heavy to cart around much longer. Something's got to go, and it's got to go soon.  
  
I almost get the urge to kill, but my humanity keeps its death grip on my consciousness just long enough for me to hear something-something that slaps me in the face but calms me at the same time. Something that squeezes at my heart painfully and caresses my skin at the same time. Something that makes me glance down to the dark grass below my perch.  
  
***I know it's out there. I know it's out there.***  
  
Her voice. Her voice rising above the soothing clamor of the crickets and whispering of my tortured mind, calling my name.  
  
"InuYasha?"  
  
I can see her in the dense night air, her sillouhette moving through the darkness like a beacon calling me away from the rocks and towards the safety of the coast. Calling me back from the edge of madness. But I don't respond. I simply watch her, remaining perfectly still on the high branch of the oak tree. She is oblivious to my presence above her, but I know she knows I'm close by.  
  
"InuYasha please." her airy voice calls out to me again, "You've been gone so long. Please come back to camp."  
  
She's never asked me to do that before. She's always respected and understood my love of solitude. She knows that this is how I've survived so long-by keeping to myself. She knows that isolation comforts me. But does she know what runs rampant in my mind when I'm alone? Could she really know something so intimate about me? Could she feel my inner distress as I battled against my mind-and against you, Kikyo? Has she come to re-claim me from you, to rescue me?  
  
I'm not angry with her for coming to search for me as I first was. I am thankful. The sound of her voice has brought me back into the land of reality and shown me what it has to offer me. Her. Her beauty. Her brilliance. Her unabashed spirit.  
  
So this is how it will end. What can I say to you now, Kikyo, when the girl I love is so near to me? Can I ask your forgiveness one more time for never telling you what I felt for you? I suppose I can. There is no harm in that, is there? Can I ask your forgiveness for everything that preceeded and followed your death and my sleep? Naraku. Your unrighteous resurrection. Our battles-both physical and emotional. The things that were never said that should have been. The things that were never done that should have been. The life that was stolen from both of us.  
  
But the past is the past. And the present is the present. And most important-the future is the future. But what can I say about yours? Only one thing comes to mind after this conversation that we had inside my head- I wish for nothing more that your peace of heart. Find peace, Kikyo. Return to the place you went when you died and be content there just as you were before you were brought back. Be free of your dirt and bone prison. Be free. You were a noble woman, good of heart and strong of mind. You deserve nothing more than your freedom.  
  
And me. What of me? Kagome is still not giving up. She knows I can hear her, and she's determined to find me. As I look at her, I see her. And it dawns on me like the morning sun as the radiance of her face looks up into the tree and sees my amber eyes looking back at her. I can see her. Not you, Kikyo. Her. Her ink black hair blending into the night air around her, the pale illuminesence of her face, the loving concern burrowed deep into her gray eyes.  
  
"InuYasha!" she gasps when she catches sight of me above her in the tree, my eyes locked on her like it was the first time I had ever seen her. Because in reality it is. After such a long time of looking at her and seeing your face looking back at me, the sight of Kagome's face is beyond dazzling. It is mesmerizing. It is riveting.  
  
She stares at me strangely, as if I have lost my mind. If she only knew the hold my mind has on me. If she only knew the thoughts that have passed through my head.  
  
So now I think I'll come down from my perch on the tree and join her and our companions at our camp. I think now is a good time to finally forget. Forget and begin again. I drop from the branch, my lithe body landing in front of her in a crouch, then straightening to my full height.  
  
"You scared me," she says, her smoke-colored eyes glowing in the dimness, her voice breathy from fright.  
  
"Sorry," I reply quietly, not even attempting to hold back the urge to grab her body and pull it close to me. I envelope her, alarming even myself with my brazeness. She tenses in my arms, startled by my unexpected action. But soon, I feel her relax, her hands slowly coming to rest on my shoulder blades, allowing her body to be molded to mine. And I relax as well, now that I am in her arms just as she's in mine.  
  
I am so overwhelmed that I've finally seen her as herself for the first time. I keep her pressed close to me, not wanting to let her go now that I've finally discovered her. But I feel her begin to disentangle herself from me, moving away from me. But she slips her hand delicately into mine as she draws away from my embrace, telling me that she hasn't rejected me.  
  
She's smiling at me like she's never known happiness before, and I am blown away by the honored feeling I get from that smile. I am the one who did that. I made her smile.  
  
And as we walk out of the woods and back to the clearing where our small fire burns and our friends lounge together, the touch of her hand tells me that she's already begun to search me. I can feel her eagerness, her devotion, and her adoration. Her eyes are already scouring my shattered soul and finding the pieces that she will soon begin to put back together for me. And I can see her as she searches. I can see her as she begins to save me from my pain, my past, and myself.  
  
Gods, I can see her. And nothing else could ever compare to the way she's looking back at me.  
  
  
  
The End.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A/N: Yee-haw!! My second completed fan fic!! * jumps around happily * I thoroughly enjoyed writing this short POV fic, and I hope all of you enjoyed reading it. If you're interested, this fic did have a sort of predecessor called "Riverwide", a similar fic but from Kikyo's POV, that you might like to read. Thanks again for reading and reviewing my story!  
  
So long, Iseult 


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